Comments on: [Links] GW2 beta, Jita Burnshttps://spinksville.wordpress.com/2012/04/30/links-gw2-beta/
MMOs and game designFri, 12 Dec 2014 22:24:23 +0000hourly1http://wordpress.com/By: roqocohttps://spinksville.wordpress.com/2012/04/30/links-gw2-beta/#comment-18570
Thu, 03 May 2012 00:52:55 +0000http://spinksville.wordpress.com/?p=6451#comment-18570OTOH, it does lower the staggering cost of producing MMOs and if it results in more and better games, then I don’t see a problem. The other side of the coin is Kickstarter and I’m hopeful that that may lead to indie developers injecting some new vitality into the kind of games that major publishers have stopped producing. And there’s something idealistic in people financing projects not to make money, but because they are passionate about the results.
]]>By: roqocohttps://spinksville.wordpress.com/2012/04/30/links-gw2-beta/#comment-18567
Wed, 02 May 2012 21:37:22 +0000http://spinksville.wordpress.com/?p=6451#comment-18567This weekends beta was in the starting areas and few of us got much over level 15. Although there are dynamic events in those areas, they are quite simple in terms of number of steps and on short repeat timers. Clearly, that makes sense for introductory areas.

Hopefully, next time, we’ll get to the more persistent world changing events when the five starting areas begin to converge.

There isn’t really a distinction between melee and ranged in GW2, since every class is able to do both, including the heavy armor classes: warriors and guardians. The melee problem only arises if you try to stand toe to toe with a powerful mob and trade blows – you can’t do that and survive:

People haven’t yet quite absorbed what Arenanet meant about losing the trinity; and will need to get used to a style of play with much more movement, evading and skill synergy than previous games.

]]>By: Sullashttps://spinksville.wordpress.com/2012/04/30/links-gw2-beta/#comment-18541
Tue, 01 May 2012 22:25:28 +0000http://spinksville.wordpress.com/?p=6451#comment-18541It’s funny, because the quality of questions and concerns about the SW:TOR story and power arc is itself a testament to how well it is done. I felt this acutely when I hopped back into WoW for a couple of weeks or so a while back – we would simply feel foolish even trying to hold that game to the same standard of internal consistency. And the quest-giver interaction felt depressingly bland. I agree with Spinks entirely, TOR did elevate the bar.

Perhaps because I spend most of my time on a Jedi Knight, I have not quite experienced the disconnect you’re talking about here. At the peak of his powers, while acknowledged as one of the best single combatants in the galaxy, he is still something of a factotum for the Jedi Council. While I’m not (yet) adequately familiar with the Inquisitor storyline, I could imagine those types being subtle and employing guises to take care of things personally. Wasn’t Palps a senator from backwater Naboo, pretending to bow and scrape to politicians while already the Dark Lord?

]]>By: spinkshttps://spinksville.wordpress.com/2012/04/30/links-gw2-beta/#comment-18518
Tue, 01 May 2012 05:40:24 +0000http://spinksville.wordpress.com/?p=6451#comment-18518I’m with you on the pre-purchase. I don’t like it as a trend, especially when release dates are not yet announced.
]]>By: Alyhttps://spinksville.wordpress.com/2012/04/30/links-gw2-beta/#comment-18517
Tue, 01 May 2012 04:24:18 +0000http://spinksville.wordpress.com/?p=6451#comment-18517It didn’t “run out” for good, just temporarily so they could make room to accommodate more players without compromising the experience for those who already purchased it, never mind the fact that it had been around for a few weeks at this point, and players were notified of the possibility in advance. Anybody that waited or didn’t know doesn’t care enough to shell out for a collector’s addition. Honestly, who would do that?

As for beta testing, the bigger problem is players treating it like a free trial when it’s an unfinished product, resulting in a game that attempts to please everyone and pleases no one. I don’t want people who won’t be playing a game to influence the direction it takes. Sure they can just filter out all the surveys with 1s (or 5s for that matter) across the board but I like that they took this route to weed out the potential trolls an open beta otherwise attracts. I never saw it as a reward for pre-purchase, and the D3 pre-purchase didn’t even grant that from my understanding.

Obviously it’s a marketing strategy but it makes more sense from a business and creative standpoint than open beta, which probably had a hand in undermining past game releases.

]]>By: smakendahedhttps://spinksville.wordpress.com/2012/04/30/links-gw2-beta/#comment-18516
Tue, 01 May 2012 01:27:24 +0000http://spinksville.wordpress.com/?p=6451#comment-18516I’d comment on the GW2 beta weekend but that would have required I pre-purchase the game to get into it. When I went to see what options were available, I saw only the collector’s edition was available (weighing in at 150$!). I noted Digital Editions were sold out.

Yes. Digital Edition… sold out.

Call me cynical, but how the hell does a digital version of the software run out?

I’ll answer that… when they need more people to buy the collector’s edition.

I might end up buying it, but I suspect it won’t be any time soon not for any reason other than I have Diablo 3 coming out soon and that will occupy me well enough.

Pre-purchase to get into beta?

What the heck is the industry coming to where beta testing is a reward?

]]>By: Guild Influence Rewards in GW2https://spinksville.wordpress.com/2012/04/30/links-gw2-beta/#comment-18514
Mon, 30 Apr 2012 19:06:41 +0000http://spinksville.wordpress.com/?p=6451#comment-18514[…] about Guild Wars 2 today after the beta weekend! If you’re looking for a general summary, Spinks has written a good overview and collected many links to different reactions. Generally folks seem to be speaking positively about the game today for […]
]]>By: Wilhelm Arcturushttps://spinksville.wordpress.com/2012/04/30/links-gw2-beta/#comment-18513
Mon, 30 Apr 2012 16:23:15 +0000http://spinksville.wordpress.com/?p=6451#comment-18513I don’t think “Blockade” is the right term. There was no effort to stop traffic in and out of Jita in general, and the only thing close to that occurred when Jita hit maximum capacity and nobody could get in. There were a few hours where participants and spectators caused access to the system to get closed down. And the event was certainly active for more than two hours a day.

Sitting on voice coms listening to things, the gank fleets were clearly targeting only freighters carrying valuable items. So lots of people came and went with no issue. I sat there in a rookie ship for hours and nobody bothered me. But for a couple dozen freighter pilots, things went bad. One guy was hauling PLEX according to the kill mail.

A lot of the activity was the battles between the Save Jita and Burn Jita fleets. People who had no interesting in ganking people showed up for the fleet fights. So declaring war on the Goons, thus making combat free of CONCORD interference, increased participation in the whole thing.

]]>By: Simon Jones who is bloglesshttps://spinksville.wordpress.com/2012/04/30/links-gw2-beta/#comment-18512
Mon, 30 Apr 2012 15:43:43 +0000http://spinksville.wordpress.com/?p=6451#comment-18512I’m still mildly bitter that on my smuggler the vast, senses shattering treasure I was rewarded with, indeed the single greatest concentration of wealth in the galaxy that I’d shot and schemed my way across the galaxy for turned out to be 500 credits.
]]>By: Simon Jones who is bloglesshttps://spinksville.wordpress.com/2012/04/30/links-gw2-beta/#comment-18511
Mon, 30 Apr 2012 15:41:11 +0000http://spinksville.wordpress.com/?p=6451#comment-18511Guild Wars 2 is a bit…hrm.

It reminds me, oddly, of Guild Wars 1 in that I like the ideas they’ve come up with, it’s just the implementation of said ideas has been so pedestrian that I wonder if someone else could have done something far more interesting with it all.

I’m going to play it but I’m also going to have doubts about the opinion of anyone who points to it as a second coming.